She didn't want to wake up.
She didn't want to face the horrible world that awaited her.
She had never experienced grief this bad before. It sneaked up on her quietly and took her under its arms in an instant. Every memory played like a song in her head, repeating itself for what seemed like forever. She was lost mostly because she had lost a big part of herself. She couldn't get that part back and she wanted it so bad as life depended on it, but it was all gone, vanished in thin air. She couldn't say it got better but it did get easier. At first, she thought grief was something bad that takes you ten feet under, but soon she learned that it was just the price she had to pay for loving someone.
She wanted to stay in the dark.
But soft hands shook her and whispered. "Come on Asterin. We need you."
That voice pulled her out of her haze. She opened her eyes. Light filled her corneas, and she had to squint to see. Threads of cream, amber, and green shaped into the form of her mother, Thalia.
Asterin tried to sit up, but her muscles ached. Her whole body hurt.
But her heart hurt more.
Her heart hurt not for herself, but for Mei.
Thalia looked weary, but managed a smile. "You slept so long. Past noon..."
"Sorry," Asterin mumbled, looking away. She hadn't wanted to upset Thalia, but sleep had been her only escape lately. When she was awake, she was forced to remember every bad thing that had happened, and that would happen in the future. Things she didn't know if she would be able to solve.
Thalia rubbed her back. "No, don't apologize. You needed rest. But you can't stay here forever. Even after..."
She didn't say it, and Asterin was grateful for that. She leaned against her pillows, feeling even more tired than when she'd first gone to sleep.
But after a second, the hopelessness and grief Asterin had felt just moments ago mixed with a bright and firm feeling of determination. There was something about a fragment of warmth that can show the coldness, something in the kiss of the sun's rays amid the cold almost-winter wind. In that moment, it was her bones that felt the chill, as if she was laying in snow instead of blankets and it was stealing everything that was her. It was as welcome as war to a soldier, even to a well trained warrior.
Nobody wants that call, the one saying battle has come to find you. Yet at the same time there was a pride under the sorrow, a glimmer of metal to face what was to come, her anger like cheese-wire under snow. Whatever took her friend was going to have her to reckon with.
That made her even more weary. But it didn't matter.
"I'm ready." Asterin whispered.
"That's my girl." Thalia whispered. She helped Asterin get out of bed. "I'll let you get ready."
"Wait!" Thalia turned back to her. "Do I have to go?" Asterin pleaded. "I don't know if I can take it."
Thalia's green eyes filled with strength. "You are many things, Asterin Somover. Weak is not one of them. Now go get ready."
She forced herself to keep moving, to walk to her vanity. She slowly dragged a brush through her deep maroon hair, and sighed. It was hopeless. What was the point of trying to look good, when the atmosphere was so bleak? She abandoned the brush, and threw on a simple grey tunic that hung off her skinny form. She shakily climbed down the crystal stairs of Winderburn.
Asterin stared out a window. The sky beyond the ocean's horizon line was stained pink as the sun set. The waves hissed quietly, as they always do. The shoreline has become a figment, as if it evaporated in the heat. She wondered if now the world is but one ocean, the waves moving freely, gathering pace. Perhaps that's what happens when you are adrift, you fear that the perfect circle of blue is all that exists. It felt as if the wind comes to bring some sensation of touch, a soft hello from nature. And she had learned, in this desert of company, that it is better to let the brain be as empty as that horizon rather than to suffer loss of hope and the tide of emotions it brings.
Her legs trembled and she reached the bottom with a heaving sigh of relief. A girl waited there, with deep black hair and moon-pale skin. Her hair was streaked with gold, and yet that, along with her expression, seemed dull.
Mei Asukai seemed even more tired than Asterin.
And she couldn't muster a smile.
"You're awake." Mei noted.
She nodded slowly. "I've been told you need me."
Mei gulped and nodded, tears sparkling in her dark eyes. "Yes. Yes, we do."
She forced herself forwards, and patted Mei on the arm. "Anything." Asterin whispered.
"Then don't hide again! You can't go away again! We need you!" Mei shouted, suddenly angry.
She straightened. "I was not hiding. I was coping. I will be with you. Always."
Mei heaved a deep, shaky sigh, before stepping back. She nodded, looking resolute.
"Good." There was now a fire in her eyes mixed with grief and pain and hurt. "It's time we find out who really murdered my brother."
YOU ARE READING
Eventide
FantasySirens; the dangerous creatures that rule the sea. The Core has been fighting them for centuries. But what the Core doesn't know is that they've brought a half-Siren into their ranks. Asterin Somover could be the weapon that wins the war against the...
